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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Charlaquin" data-source="post: 8476688" data-attributes="member: 6779196">It’s an interesting line of reasoning, and it does make the NPC -> PC procedure symmetrical to the PC -> NPC procedure, which might be aesthetically pleasing. But, I don’t think it’s what the rules as written actually suggest doing. There’s nowhere that I’m aware of where the rules say a (non-DM) player ought to determine if an action can succeed, fail, and has consequences. The player does, as I understand it, decide what their character thinks, feels, and does, and basically nothing else. So, while I think this is a great way to run it, and basically how I handle it when it’s PC -> PC, I don’t actually think it’s supported by the rules.I think where our analysis differ is in how we understand the process by which the DM determines whether an action succeeds, fails, or requires a roll. In this construction, you seem to suggest that the DM can simply make that decision arbitrarily, and use the fact that the DM being able to arbitrarily decide that an action meant to force a PC to take a specific action would be obviously unfair. But, rather than this indicating the player ought to make the decision, I would argue that this indicates the decision is not meant to be arbitrary. The DM is meant to determine, not decide, whether the action succeeds, fails, or requires a roll to be resolved, and while making that determination necessarily requires the DM to use their own judgment, the rules provide guidance on how the DM ought to make the determination. That element of personal judgment is why I prefer to say a given ruling on an action resolution is supported or not supported rather than allowed or not allowed. Technically, the rules don’t say a DM can’t just say “the goblin intimidates you. He succeeds without needing to make a check and you hand over all your gold”, but doing so would be contrary to the guidance the rules offer on how to determine the outcome of an action, so the DM would not be well-supported in making that call.So, how do the rules say the DM should make the determination? Well, the guidance for this is kind of scattered throughout the PHB and the DMG, which is why I say this understanding kind of needs to be arrived at from a thorough and holistic reading of all of the rules. But, I think most if not all of us are in agreement that the rules at least suggest ruling automatic failure if success would not reasonably be possible and automatic success if failure would not be possible. As well, the DMG presents a few heuristics for when a DM might call for a check to determine whether an action succeeds or fails - rolling with it, ignoring the dice, or balancing between the two, with the existence of a cost or consequence for failure suggested as a determining factor, and with no progress and progress combined with a setback both suggested as possible outcomes of failure. Rolling with it and ignoring the dice are called out as having drawbacks, while balancing between the two is not. There are also lots of rules regarding the resolution of specific actions, such as spells.To bring this back to the topic of actions meant to force a PC to make a specific decision, I think the “roleplaying rule” provides us with guidance on how the DM ought to determine success or failure in this situation - the player decides what their character thinks, feels, and does, so in the absence of more specific rules governing the resolution of a particular action, the DM is advised to let the player decide whether an action that would cause their character to think, feel, or do something succeeds, fails, or requires a roll. And note that something happening to a character (such as getting knocked prone) is not the same thing as that character doing something. Likewise, the character gaining knowledge (such as knowledge that they’re being lied to) is not the same as the character thinking something.</blockquote>

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